fairly new to PHP and webdesign.... I have a website which has a bunch of products for vehicles - all of this is stored in a database.
In order to narrow down what products are available, I want to take the user through 2-3 pages where they firstly select what categorey of product they want, then what make of car they have, then the model, then I want to run a mysql query with that information and return the answerson a page.
I already have the code to request the info from a database and then display it on the page, but The way the current website is setup, they are hard coded mysql queries (meaning the user didnt input any data to get there).
So how can I transfer variable between php pages? Page 1 (contains Categorey) - then pass to Page 2 (contains Make) then page to Page 3 (contains Model) then compile the three variavles collections, and pass them to results.php (a standard results page which Gets variables and then searches).
I know this might seem basic, but I am really stumped as to how to get it coded.
If someone can give me an a newbie explanation about how to achieve this? Thank you
You can pass PHP variables through URLs for example
Your HTML code,
<a href='yourPage.php?yourVariable=someValue'>TEST!</a>
Your PHP code,
if (isset($_GET['yourVariable'])) {
$yourVariable = $_GET['yourVariable'];
// Your code here.
}
Now using this you can create what you want with a little bit of tinkering.
Remember
You need to use $_GET because parameters are being passed using the URL and not a POST request.
Don't forget to clean all input.
Related
I am a beginner programmer/coder who is currently trying to get to grips with HTML and PHP. I currently have a locally hosted searchable database that (when used) brings up a list of the first twenty entries that correspond to your search terms, with buttons to send you to the next page, last page, etc. (you know... pages...) The search outputs information into the URL ([url]?q=Alphonse&f=Elric etc). I have two problems with this at the moment.
Problem A:
My URL contains information that is unused. If I don't put anything into the search term it simply comes out with "q=&x=&f=..." etc. This makes the URL absurdly long even on the most simple searches.
Can this be cleaned up through just php?
Would this method be different if I end up hosting this online?
Problem B:
The way my paging functions is to send the user to the following link '.$_SERVER['PHP_SELF'].'?'.$_SERVER['QUERY_STRING'].'&pn='.$nextPage.'. This outputs the current link but with "pn=1" at the end (Or whatever relevant page they click).
This method itself makes the URL quite messy. If they click through multiple pages, and perhaps go back and forth, the link ends up having "pn=1&pn=2&pn=3&pn=1...." etc at the end. I assume that this will be answered by the first query, but it is slightly different in that this is information that is actually present.
How do I remove this superfluous information, and just keep the (final) relevant one?
I am thinking that I can use parse_str to turn the URL into an array, then delete each entry of the array that are empty, then create a new string out of that array and make that the link the search/next page button goes to.
Does that sound like it would work? If so, how do I delete those specific array entries, and how would that array then be stored? Would the array lose those entries and calling a deleted entry "$array['1']" for example result in an error, or does deleting entries in an array move everything up one to fill the gap?
Apologies if I'm asking too many different things in one post here!
I'm currently only using PHP to take user submissions, put them in a database, and echo them out on a page using SQL to select from a table, such as comments. I need a system that will automatically update comments without refreshing the page like on YouTube. The less the user has to manually update, the better.
I want it to work pretty much exactly how YouTube and Twitter function, where it'll say "x NEW COMMENT(s)" and clicking that updates everything.
My teacher recommended a JQuery function, but I don't have any background in that language so I don't know where to begin looking.
I'm at a complete impasse. I will update this if you guys need additional information to aid in my search.
You are looking for AJAX
You will need a HTML page with jQuery/AJAX that calls another PHP page. In that PHP page you do the DB request and then ideally return the data as JSON so that your frontend part can display it to the user.
As every one says, AJAX is the way. You can find a simple blog I did on it here.
OK - Thanks for taking the time!
I am using WP on a CentOS 6 server. I have a plug in with the functions, I have a function that makes a DB call and populates relevant products based on $_GET variables, I took from one of the other project and modify it so it works! But here where I run in to the problem, I go to the main page and i have a function that gets called first, goes through the URL name and determines the categories id and then from that I need to pass that to the URL so that when the next function then calls $_GET["category_id"] and that ID is there and ready to be use and it it does its magic. (all staying on the same page no refreshing or anything)
So I need to put that on the URL as the page is being loaded and so that I can use it (Again i get the variables from a function that is doing all the work with the address for relevant info,) So how do i do it? HTML or PHP, and a straight forward way no extra installs would be nice :)
Edit 1:
So is there something then I could integrate in that would be simple and straight forward that would allow me to do a mini refresh and get the right variables in place, never used JavaScript but seams to be getting or something in php ... Ideas are welcome :)
You can with javascript and the history API
The only way you can change the url without actually redirecting the user is by using the pushState method.
e.g. open a console and copy and paste this:
var stateObj = { foo: "bar" };
history.pushState(stateObj, "changes url to stackoverflow.com/yes-you-can", "/yes-you-can");
You won't be redirected, and the url of your browser will change unless, basically, you're using IE 9 or less. You can see a demo of this on html5demos.com
OK here is how I am going to get around this problem I am having
I made a new table in the DB and then I already have a list of the Domain We are using, so then I am going to give to the customer there are three columns and they will manually enter the fields and it will be on them to manage and change what they want displayed on the webpage.
CVS import and then BAM! done! just pull $_SERVER["SERVER_NAME"] and then compare that to the domain column and done! (I will have what ever cat's and sizes they want and it will not be on us to create any complicated functions and if statements for exceptions and it is in there hands!)
Not the exact answer I wanted to get but much easier and not so much complicated :)
I have a website and I want to make it easier for someone to change certain information being shown without them having to edit the HTML/PHP and using FTP.
At the moment I have this information in a php file which is included in the MYSQL query.
It would be a lot easier if this was done using a form, say a text field where a person can type the table name and it updates on the main page and starts displaying that table instead.
Sorry if I haven't explained this well. :(
I have a good news for you.
Every php/mysql-driven site in the world is made this exact way - to edit site contents using HTML form.
Even first PHP version name was PHP/FI, stands for Form Interpreter.
Even better, a site user doesn't have to deal with mysql - it's all being done in PHP. No need to type table names into form field - all table names already written in PHP code.
Usual PHP application being connected to just one mysql database - so, no need to choose.
As for the tables, it's being done this way: a user selects some human-readable matter, like "Latest news" and being redirected to the PHP script called, say, news.php. this script runs a query for the news table in the database and outputs some HTML formatted news highlights!
Even more, you don't even need to program! There are plenty of ready-made programs, such as Wordpress
store what you want to be editable in a mysql text field.
remove tags you dont want him to see
in the form echo the editable information in a textarea
have him edit
add tags
update the mysql
note depending on the users knowledge depends on how many tags you would like to remove/add. the less per a field the easier.
on more complicated things i like to have the person log in. if he has permission then all the editable fields have an edit button. if he clicks it it goes to a page with a form that he can use to edit that 1 field
I am not sure the correct terminology for the process that I am trying to describe. I don't even know which platform is underlying the technique. If you understand my description, please give the link to the site(s) and or the keyword name of the process. I think it is done by AJAX, but I am not certain. I use php as the backend code, I just need to find a way to dynamically display the results. Please give suggestions. I forgot the name of the sites that use this, and my link history expired.
TIA
Description:
The page would have a search form and options. After the user submits, the search is initiated, and the results appear inside the dedicated result area. The page does not refresh, just the info inside the result area.
The display area will show 20 (or whatever) results (lines). There will be next, and previous buttons. If you hit next, the next set of results will display.
I am writing a code that generates 20 results for each display. There is no set number of results, so the results might have a start/first page, but do not have an end page.
Each time the user hits 'next', the program would generate/load new results. It would also store previous results, so that when a user hits 'prev', the previous results can instantly come up.
What techniques/program are theses?
Having recently handled pagination with Code Igniter (php framework), the following links might help you and anyone else out:
http://tympanus.net/jPaginate/
http://codeigniter.com/forums/viewthread/93045/
Usability is important and AJAX pagination introduces some important questions that need addressing regarding pagination, the following article will give some usability guidelines for displaying results in a table:
http://thedesignvanguard.com/crud-r-for-read
Code Igniter Prototype Framework Ajax Pagination:
http://codeigniter.com/wiki/AJAX_Pagination_with_CI_Pagination_Library/
Since we're using jQuery, we chose the following, Codeigniter jQuery framework for AJAX pagination
http://tohin.wordpress.com/2008/08/12/codeigniter-ajax-pagination/
http://tohin.wordpress.com/2008/10/07/codeigniter-ajax-pagination-exampleguideline/
It is not AJAX for sure.
Nobody uses AJAX for the pagination.
And there are about zillion pagination examples over internet
The only thing is never described in articles is how to persist search options for the other pages.
But it's simple enough: http_build_query() can help you
You need to have a GET/POST form submitted via AJAX which contains the fields in the search term and page number.
If you are going to set the page size to 20 results, page_num=4 will show results from 61-80 results.
Usually search results are GET instead of POST (Ex: See Google search results ) along with the page_number as another attribute and value.
#IVAN .. good to know that the library came helpful..
About that searching option; check the recent commit in github
http://github.com/neotohin/CodeIgniter-Ajax-pagination-Library there is an additional parameter added for searching.
I think the simple code in readme is enough for understanding the mechanism.
You could use datatables
https://datatables.net/
https://datatables.net/examples/data_sources/server_side.html
With this plugin using jquery also you could use server sided page request , you just have to handle the plugin post using Ajax.
post automatically sends row , page offset column, search criteria you just have to provide the json encode return
and the plugin automatically has library in featuring pagination, search sort number of rows per page and the table formatting.
Needed are jquery, and the plugin css and js for this to work
let me know if you understood my explanation.
thanks (=